Runnin’
by DefendTheUndefended
Summary: Zuko dies by his sisters hand. About a month after Aang won against Ozai, strange things start happening. When the Gaang investigates they stumble on a whole knew world that no one expected. And not only that but they get a long lost friend back as well.
1. Summary

Summary

Zuko dies by his sisters hand not long after being hit while trying to save Katara from the lightning bolt.

About a month after Aang won against Ozai and General Iroh took the title of Firelord, strange things start happening.

Monsters start appearing, killing living people, missing people had been found in white ashes, and crushing pressure can be felt at times in smaller towns where no one can move and or sometimes breathe.

When the Gaang investigates they stumble on a whole knew world that no one expected. And not only that but they get a long lost friend back as well.

Bleach and Avatar The Last Airbender Crossover. I don't own Bleach or ATLA


	2. 1) Still Alive

Still Alive

1

\--(xXx)--

 _A gentle care free smile._

 _The warmth of a caressing flame._

 _Ringing laughter echoing off the walls._

 _A bonfire with people that he felt where important to him around it._

 _An almost uncomfortable heat in the air._

 _Warmth from flames dancing around his body as he avoids them, two kinds one warm and gentle the other burning and vicious._

 _A crackle then a yell before unbearable pain._

Two golden eyes snapped open as their owner sat bolt upright. He sat their staring for a second before the tenseness rippled avross his body slowly drained out of him.

There was a groan beside him and he looked over to see his mate slowly opening her eyes. The brown hair around the woman's face shifted a little as she looked up at her bigger in frame mate who was sitting up looking down at her.

"Hey, you alright?" The golden eyed man slowly nodded. He hated waking his mate when he had the same dream over and over.

"Yea I'm fine Starrk, go back to sleep." The brunette yawned before grabbing the others arm and pulling him down to the bed.

"Not without you." The golden eyed male chuckled before relenting and closing his eyes following his mate into sleep.

\--(xXx)--

Aang sighed for what felt like the millionth time that day as he passed the turtleduck pond that had been renamed in honor of Zuko, not too long after Zuko had died trying to save his waterbending teacher, Katara, from a bolt of lightening.

The pond had almost been destroyed by the previous Firelord in a fit of rage sometime after Zuko had been banished as a child. Firelord Ozai had been angry at the time. At what no one knew. All they knew was that the pond had seen good memories of both Zuko and his mom before she dissapeared.

After destroying it Ozai had made several earthbending and waterbending servants quote 'get rid off it'. The servants having at least some heart for the missing queen an her exciled son relocated it instead of just making it dissapear.

It was now located, not too far outside the palace walls, or the edge of a high cliff that overlooked an small alcove 100 feet below that could be used as a beach, if you didn't die trying to get too it, that was located on the left of the cliff. In every other direction was wide expanses of sea with rocks near the shore, which waves constantly crashed against.

When Iroh, who insisted that after the ceremony of him taking up the role of FireLord, that they all went to the little pond, had showed it too them Sokka absentmindedly commented that if they had known about this cliff and the beach uhhit would have made the invasion alot easier.

He had gotten drenched by both Katara and Aang with seawater for the comment, even if they slightly agreed, luckily Iroh just laughed it off.

After telling them about the, at the time, oddly placed pond and what it meant to both Zuko and his mother and that he would like to bury Zuko there under the FireBloom tree that had luckily been untouched by Ozai's assault when it had originally been on the palace grounds, they had to agree is was the perfect place for their fallen family member.

Because Zuko was family. He had been apart of their small dysfunctional, family. Just like the rest of them. They had just never gotten the chance to tell him.

After the burial, which was painful for everyone, it had been several weeks before random people that they probably never would meet again stopped coming to the little pond and stone tablet, that had his name etched into it along with a permanent painting of him, that rested under the FireBloom tree.

They had come to apologize to him.

It didn't stop at FireNation soldiers and citizens though. People all over the world had come to his grave throughout those several few weeks. Even a small family from a rural earth kingdom town, they barely anyone knew about, came. Aang had gone over to them at the time because they had seemed to be acting as if they knew him a bit more than the others.

He asked and then received a tale of a traveler on an ostrichhorse that not only saved the preteen with them, but the town itself. The rest of the villagers couldn't see it but the small family did. The boy had even showed Aang a small dagger with an inscription on it that Zuko had given the boy to protect himself.

(The boy broke down at that part while trying to rapidly wipe away unwanted tears on his part) He had told Aang that he had slapped the dagger out of Zuko's hand when Zuko had tried to give it back to him after he saved the boy and also revealing his identity. Zuko had taken it with him at the time only for the boy to find it on his bed when they had returned home.

The boy had taken the dagger and threw it into a large field with grass so tall it reached your waist, the same one Zuko had taught the boy how to well daisho swords in, later on when the boy saw the good that consequently came from Zuko's actions he had searched through the field for three weeks constanly till he found it.

Later om that night when he sat down privately for tea with Firelord Iroh and told him the story he was told. Iroh wept do two reasons.

The first was that Zuko had been trying to change his ways that far back and he hadn't realized it and that his actions along with others had probably made it worse by making him go back to how he used to be before all of that, and the second was because the dagger had been the same one he had given Zuko as a child way before Zuko had been exciled.

Zuko had cared and worried enough about that boy and his families safety to give the only one he saw was able enough to make use of it, a dagger which had always been very precious to him.

That story and the circumstances surrounding it always stuck in Aang's mind. Why it did? He doesn't know, it just did. Of course he had so many conflicting emotions at first, but he was over them.

He had been heading back inside to speak with Firelord Iroh when had passed the memorial site. He paused and changed directions, instead going towards the tree.

Once reaching it he sat down beside the stone tablet and overlooked the ocean. He sighed and let his head softly thunk against the bark of the tree he was leaning against. He gazed up at the mix of red leaves and glowing golden colored blossoms.

They were named FireBloom Trees for a reason, if you looked at them when they where in full bloom it looked as if the tree was a comforting and soft dancing flame.

He sighed again and spoke up into the display. "What am I gonna do Zuko?" An issue had risen up in another earth kingdom town about the speculation of writer they would even attemp to trust the knew Firelord. It had been on the edge of turning physical for a couple of weeks now.

At that moment a mildly strong wind rushed passed and headed out towards the ocean causing several loose petals and leaves to be pulled off their branches causing them to dance on the wind traveling out to sea.

Had they have been from any other tree they would probably have looked like embers from a burning cataclysm, but being from a FireBloom tree it looked right. It looked beautiful and serene. Peaceful.

Aang smiled and looked over to the stone beside him. He figured it out. He had his answer.

"Thank you, friend."


	3. 2) Sledgehammer

Sledgehammer

2

\--(xXx)--

Screams echoed through the air and the woods surrounding a small town, startling the birds nesting in the trees. They fled high into the skies while below them it seemed as if the ground had begun to shake.

Suddenly hundreds of animals all various in types burst out from through the trees. Predators and prey alike, ignoring each other and instead just trying to run.

Run from what?

Unadulterated fear. Fear that came from those screams and an unimaginable pressure in the air. The smell of death and blood. The feeling of a predator far stronger and far more dangerous than anything they had ever known before.

In the distance the screams cut off.

All was silent, but far from peaceful.

\--(xXx)--

A lean teenager,close to being a man, with brown hair pulled back into a tight ponytail, who wore blue clothes with a sword at his side. Stood with his mouth slightly open and his eyes wide stared at the streets of a small village surrounded with trees.

The dusty roads where littered with clothes strown in ways that showed they were being worn not long ago. Inside the clothes and slightly on the outside of them was white ash. Ash of the bodies that once inhabited the items surrounding them.

"Who could have done something like this?" A horrified voice caught his attention and he turned to face its owner. To eager to get his eyes off of the horror scenes in front of him.

It was his sister. A beautiful woman with brown hair that reached her waist, and shining blue eyes that were filled with horror and slight tears. She also wore blue closed and had a slender bottle like canister at her waist.

"I don't know. I'm not sure if I want to know." He uttered, swallowing hard before looking down. His eyes unwillingly trailed back to the Ash covered clothes and he grit his teeth. "Katara, we can't do anything here now. This is the third incident. We need to go get Aang before another one happens." He spoke in a rush as he turned around, his hand on his sword, and walked back the way him and Katara had come.

"But Sokka-!" Katara said as she spun her head around towards him with wide eyes, only for her brother to cut her off.

"No Katara. I hate it too, but there isn't anything we can do." He had stopped in his tracks as he spoke and glared down at the ground in front of him.

Katara breathed out a gulp of air and her eyes drifted back to the clothes. Her eyes automatically spotted a smaller set, with a little cloth doll laying beside the left sleeve. She swallowed hard and forced her eyes to the ground. She nodded heavily and turned to follow her brother.

Sokka started to walk ahead when he heard his sister move. Heading towards the huge fluffy snot monster, named Appa, so they could go back home to get the Avatar.

Probably the only one that'd be able to find out what did this, how, and why.

Why someone would turn innocent people into ash.


End file.
